Category Archives: Mars

Legendary Apollo 11 astronaut Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin on Saturday hailed "all the folks" at NASA and its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) on the successful landing of the Perseverance rover on the surface of Mars.

Aldrin, the second man to walk on the moon, following Neil Armstrong, during the Apollo 11 mission in July 1969, shared his observations during a call-in interview on Fox News "Cavuto Live."

The New Jersey native, who turned 91 in January, has long been an advocate of efforts by the U.S. space program to explore Mars, the next planet after Earth in the direction away from the Sun.

Fox host Neil Cavuto began the segment by sharing the latest video images from Mars that were captured by Perseverance, the fifth rover that NASA has sent to the planet and ninth overall NASA landing there, according to The Associated Press.

HOW WILL NASAS PERSEVERANCE ROVER ENGINEERS PILOT FIRST HELICOPTER ON MARS?

He then asked Aldrin for his reaction to the Marslanding.

"I think its a great tribute to all the folks at NASA, led by Jim Bridenstine and all the other people, especially those in the control room at JPL," Aldrin said.

Bridenstine, the NASA administrator who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, left the agency Jan. 20, as President Biden took office.

Cavuto later asked Aldrin to estimate what year humans will be able to reach the surface of Mars.

"About 10, 20 years ago, my estimate was around 2030, 2033, and that was earlier than most other people were figuring," Aldrin responded.

Former astronaut Buzz Aldrin. (Associated Press)

"Weve got to do a good number of things in Artemis, our manned program to the moon ," he continued. "So its gonna take the first one at the moon and then the public is going to be ready to see the next, which will be a sophisticated improvement on manned missions."

Other planned missions to Mars include the landing of a smaller rover by China, scheduled for late spring, and a spacecraft from the United Arab Emirates that went into Martian orbit last week, the AP reported.

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Aldrin was previously in the news in January when he received his first coronavirus vaccine shot, just days ahead of his 91st birthday.

"I urge everyone to sign up for a vaccination as soon as possible when eligible to do, so that life can return to normal soon," Aldrin wrote on Twitter.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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Buzz Aldrin reacts to NASAs Perseverance rover landing on Mars - Fox News

NASAs newest robotic explorer has landed safely on Mars after a nearly 300-million-mile journey that began on a Florida launch pad.

The agencysPerseverance rovertouched down on the Red Planet at 3:55 p.m. EST Thursday, bringing an end to the seven minutes of terror that saw a fiery atmospheric entry and parachute-assisted descent. The rovers landing mechanism then firedeight retrorockets to slow down and guide it to a proper landing spot before using nylon cords to lower it onto the surface.

"Touchdown confirmed! Perseverance is safely on the surface of Mars, ready to begin seeking the signs of past life," exclaimedNASA engineer Swati Mohan.

The first image captured by NASA's Perseverance rover of the surface of Mars after its successful landing on Thursday, Feb. 18, 2021.(Photo: NASA)

All told, the unique landing maneuver successfully decelerated Perseverance from thousands of miles an hour to just 1.7 mph at touchdown. And because ofan 11-minute delay in transmissions from Earth to Mars, the rover did it all on its own no human input was possible.

Mission managers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California quickly received data from Mars satellites and the rover itself confirming a good touchdown, including the first images from Perseverance: scenes of a desolate, dusty landscape that looks dangerous to humans but full of potential for this scientist-explorer.

"We got it. We're there," JPL Chief Engineer Rob Manning, who has worked on Mars landings for decades,said after landing."This is so exciting and the team is beside themselves. This is so surreal. So much has been riding on this."

Just minutes after the landing, Perseverance continued sending imagesfrom its hazard-detecting navigational cameras.

This photo made available by NASA shows the second image sent by the Perseverance rover showing the surface of Mars, just after landing in the Jezero crater, on Thursday, Feb. 18, 2021.(Photo: NASA via AP)

Manning also confirmed teams knew exactly where the rover landed well ahead of schedule.

"This is a sign that NASA works," Manning said."When we put our arms together and our hands together and our brains together, we can succeed. This is what NASA does and this is what we can do as a country."

NASA officials celebrate as NASA's Mars Perseverance rover landed inside a crater on Feb. 18, 2021, after traveling in space for 204 days. Once the rover lands, it will embark on a two-year mission of searching for ancient microbial life.(Photo: Handout, NASA)

The Red Planet's newcomer now finds itself in Jezero Crater, a region of Mars once believed to harbor a massive lake fed by rivers of running water. The regolith and rocks here will be prime targets for Perseverance's suite of instruments designed to hunt for past or present signs of life.

Live video was made possible by NASA during Perseverance's approach, entry, descent, and landing.

Perseverance is our robotic astrobiologist, and it will be the first rover NASA has sent to Mars with the explicit goal of searching for signs of ancient life, said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASAs Science Mission Directorate.

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Though Perseverance isn't the first rover on Mars the U.S. and other countries have been targeting the Red Planet for decades it's the most advanced and fastest, and it will likely survive longer than its predecessors in this harsh, dustyenvironment.

Unlike older rovers that relied on solar power, for example, Perseverance runs on nuclear power. This is especially important on a planet where massive, global dust storms can render solar panels useless.

"It's the biggest and best rover that we've ever sent to Mars," said NASA's Director of theJet Propulsion Laboratory Mike Watkins. "It can really do amazing things in terms of its own scientific exploration of this habitable environment at Jezero."

NASA expects Perseverance's surface mission to last about one Martian year, or two Earth years.

NASA's Mars Perseverance rover is on the cusp of landing on the Red Planet after a seven-month journey. Here's what happens next. USA TODAY

The 2,200-pound rover, nearly identical though slightly larger than its 2012 Curiosity predecessor, has several suites of onboard instruments that will be used to find, analyze, and store rock samples. A drill on the end of its "arm" is designedto grab core samples, while systems that use X-rays and ultraviolet spectrometers can conduct scientific investigations right there on the surface.

There's some forward-thinking, too: Perseverance can not only store its core samples in tubes and put those in its "body," but it can later remove and scatter them around the surface of Jezero Crater for a yet-to-be-scheduledsample return mission. Though Perseverance is no slouch with its onboard instruments, scientists hope to use their own tools and equipment on samples obtained directly from Mars.

Manasvi Lingam, a professor of astrobiology, aerospace, physics and space sciences at Florida Tech, said bringing samples back to Earth hastwo advantages for scientists: the breadth and number of instruments available on Earth vastly outclass whats available on Perseverance; and despite technological advances, having a human eye looking at samples is still the preferred method.

Any sign of life will of course be one of the most momentous discoveries in the entire history of humanity, Lingam said. Even if it is extinct life, just knowing that there was something out there is certainly Nobel Prize-level.

Nicknamed "Percy" by her Jet Propulsion Laboratory mission managers, NASA's latest rover isn't alone in Jezero Crater. A small, 4-pound helicopter named Ingenuity hitched a ride down to the surface on the rover's "belly."

Ingenuity's mission is simple and unrelated to the larger science objectives: conduct the first-ever flight on another world. To accomplish this in an atmosphere just 1% as dense as Earth's, NASA had to build a small vehicle with large carbon fiber blades and make it light enough to lift off.

Using two cameras, the small helicopter will attempt the first test flights over a yet-to-be-determined 30-day period.Ingenuity could offer robotic and human explorers of the future a critical high-level view of the planet.

Perseverance began its journey to Mars in July 2020 on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, which vaulted the payload on a complicated trajectory from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

"We or our heritage rockets have done every U.S. mission to Mars, so it's something that's really special to us," Tory Bruno, CEO of ULA, told Florida Today, part of the USA TODAY Network. "We're really excited and honored to be trusted with a mission like this to Mars."

NASAs newest rover landed safely on Mars after a nearly 300 million-mile journey that began on a Florida launch pad. USA TODAY

Bruno said all missions are important, but science-focused ones like Perseverance have a special place in his company, which is focused on its next-generation Vulcan Centaur rocket for flights of all types.

"The missions we launch are always important," Bruno said. "This is some group of people's life's work. The research they have done leading up to this and the work on the spacecraft itself is a career all alone."

"If you lose that spacecraft or you don't deliver it the way it needs to be delivered in order for it to do its mission, sometimes there's no recovering from that. Their whole career culminated in this mission and they don't have a second career to do another one," Bruno said.

"We take that very, very seriously."

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Contributing: Jay Cannon, USA TODAY

Follow reporter Emre Kelly on Twitter:@EmreKelly

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Perseverance rover successfully lands on Mars, a key step in NASAs search for signs of life - USA TODAY

Mars rover Perseverance has landed on the surface of Mars after a white-knuckle descent involving picking a landing spot just moments before making a rocket-powered sky-crane landing. The rover immediately sent back its first image of Jezero Crater, which it will be exploring over the course of its mission.

A clearly tense but optimistic team watched as Perseverance made its final approach to Mars a few hours ago, confirming it was on track to hit the bullseye of Jezero Crater, the ancient delta where the rover will soon be roving.

Except for a few brief but expected communications blackouts caused by the superheated air around the craft as it entered the thin Martian atmosphere, the lander sent back a continuous stream of updates to the team on Earth considerably delayed, of course, by the distance to the other planet.

The team, and charmingly the on-screen hosts at mission HQ audibly gasped, whispered yes! and made other signs of their excitement as news trickled in that atmosphere entry had occurred on time, that the craft hadnt broken up during the 10-G braking maneuver, that the parachute had deployed, that a landing site was found by the ground-facing radar, that the powered descent and sky crane had commenced and, at last, finally that the rover had safely touched down on the surface.

Image Credits: NASA

Cheering but, in accordance with COVID-19 precautions not (as they normally would) hugging each other, the team celebrated the landing and soon were treated to the first images sent back from the rover.

These initial pictures are low-quality ones sent just seconds after landing by the hazard camera, a fisheye used for navigation. As the dust settles (literally) and the rover initiates its more powerful devices and cameras, well have new, color images probably within an hour or two.

For a more complete look at the mission and its remarkable landing method, you can read yesterdays profile of the Perseverance mission. The next few days will probably be less exciting than the terror-inducing landing, but soon the rover will be up and running around Jezero, looking for evidence of life on Mars and testing technology that could be used by human visitors in the future.

Were not ready to go there with astronauts yet, but the robots are ready, said JPL director Michael Watkins on the broadcast. We start by sending, you know, our eyes and arms there in the form of a robot. It is just fantastic to be able to do that, and to learn from each rover, learn from the science and the engineering, and make the next one better, and make more and more discoveries. Every time we do one of these missions, we make fabulous discoveries and you know, each one is more exciting than the last.

Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

The exciting thing everyone is looking forward to, Mars helicopter Ingenuity, will hopefully take flight soon as well.

We have a series of major milestones between now and the first flight. Tomorrow, well turn on the helicopter, and the space station could confirm its health. The next major milestone will be when the rover deploys the helicopter on the surface, and that marks the first moment that Ingenuity operates on its own in a standalone manner, said MiMi Aung, project manager and engineering lead for Ingenuity. Surviving that first cold frigid night of Mars will be a major milestone, then well execute a series of checkouts, and then we will perform that very important first flight. And if the first flight is successful, we have up to four more flights in the 30 Martian days that we have set aside for our flight experiments.

The helicopter project will definitely be novel, but its not just about recording a first for the sake of NASA being able to say they did it; Ingenuity will hopefully lay a firm technical foundation for future exploration.

A helicopter flying far ahead of rovers and astronauts in the future can provide high-definition reconnaissance information for the rovers and the astronauts before they take long journeys, Aung said. And as importantly, being able to fly will enable us to get to places that we cannot get to with rovers and astronauts, like sides of steep cliffs, deep inside crevices, all areas of high scientific interest. It will be game changing.

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Perseverance lands safely on Mars and sends back its first images of the surface - TechCrunch

Just minutes after NASA's Perseverance rover stuck its landing on Mars, it sent back two historic images our first-ever views of the red planet from the elusive Jezero Crater.

Percy, as the rover is nicknamed, got through the "seven minutes of terror" on Thursday a series of make-or-break events to land. A successful landing was announced just before 4 p.m. ET from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California.

"Touchdown confirmed! Perseverance is safely on the surface of Mars, ready to begin seeking the signs of past life!" Swati Mohan, a guidance, navigation and control officer monitoring telemetry at JPL, called out as the rover landed. Socially-distanced flight engineers burst into cheers and applause as they breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Just moments later, scientists received the rover's first two pictures, showing a rocky view of the rover's new home.

One of the rover's Hazard Avoidance Cameras, which primarily help with driving, snapped the black-and-white shots. The camera is partially obscured by a clear protective cover. Later images from the rover will be higher-resolution.

Percy itself can also be seen in the first image its large shadow announcing its arrival.

The photos mark one of the rover's first successes, and show the team on Earth that it made it to Mars safely.

"Hello, world. My first look at my forever home," the rovertweeted upon arrival.

President Joe Biden watched the rover landing live from the White House.

"Congratulations to NASA and everyone whose hard work made Perseverance's historic landing possible," he tweeted. "Today proved once again that with the power of science and American ingenuity, nothing is beyond the realm of possibility."

Scientists said they hope to view "pretty spectacular" video and audio footage, as well as additional photos, within the next few days.

The rover, NASA's most sophisticated to date, will soon begin its hunt for signs of ancient life. Billions of years ago, the Jezero Crater was home to a large lake, and Percy will collect samples that will be the first to make the trek back to Earth for scientists to examine.

During the first month, they also plan to test a small 4.5-pound, $80 millionhelicopter named Ingenuity. It will attempt the first powered flight in the thin Martian air, a "Wright brothers' moment" on another world.

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NASA reveals first two photos of Mars taken by the Perseverance rover - CBS News

The possibility of life on Mars has excited the imagination. Among the scientific community, the current thinking is that life may have existed on the earths ruddy planetary neighbour a long time ago. Understanding this will enrich our studies of evolution and nurture of life outside the earth. The recent NASA mission, Mars 2020, that was launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida on July 30, 2020, landed on the Jezero Crater in Mars on February 18, to much celebration. Of special magnificence was the entry, descent and landing of the missions Perseverance rover, described as the shortest and most intense part. Entering the Martian atmosphere at about 20,000 km per hour, the mission had to bring the Perseverance rover to a halt on the surface in just seven minutes. Also, since it takes 11 minutes for a radio signal to reach the earth from Mars, the mission control could not really guide the landing, and the rover had to complete this process by itself. During the complicated landing process, using a camera eye, the rover checked the ground below to avoid hazardous terrain, all in a few breathtaking minutes.

NASAs exploration of Mars has focused on finding traces and trails of water that may have existed, and relate it to finding evidence of ancient life. Its earlier Mars expedition which carried the Curiosity rover, landed on August 5, 2012. It identified regions that could have hosted life. Expected to last at least the duration of one Mars year, or about 687 earth days, the science goals this time are to look for signs of ancient life and collect rock and soil samples. Perseverance will take the inquiry made by Curiosity to the next level and search for signs of past life by studying the Jezero Crater. The crater was chosen for study as based on an earlier aerial survey, it was found to be home to an ancient delta. Clay minerals and carbonates were seen, making the crater a good place to search for lifes existence. Further, the rover will study the geology here and store samples in a place that can be accessed by a future mission which would return them to the earth. The rover will test out technologies that could help sustain the presence of humans there in the future. This includes an instrument to extract oxygen from the atmospheric carbon dioxide. The rover also carries a helicopter named Ingenuity that is specially designed to fly in Marss thin atmosphere; its sole purpose would be to demonstrate flight on Mars. Finally, to the question whether little green microbes did inhabit Mars in the distant past only time and Perseverance can answer that.

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Time and perseverance: On NASAs rover on Mars - The Hindu

In his Healy home on Thursday, 10-year-old Kyler Frazier, dressed in a blue NASA shirt, cheered as the federal space agencys new Mars rover landed on the red planet.

The 2,260-pound rover touched down in the bowl of a dried-out crater lake and carried with it unusual cargo: a minuscule, stenciled copy of a short essay written by the fourth grader.

I was so excited, I clapped with all the Mission Control people. And my baby brother clapped with me, Kyler said.

He is one of three students in Alaska who were chosen as semifinalists in a contest to name the new rover. The contest received more than 28,000 entries. The winner, seventh grade student Alex Mather of Virginia, gave the rover its name: Perseverance.

But essays written by all 155 semifinalists were carried on a 293-million-mile journey by the spacecraft to the planet. The essays are stenciled onto a tiny silicon chip mounted to the top of the rover.

It was really exciting to find out that I was one of those 155 people, and I thought I was the luckiest kid in the world, Kyler said.

Arabella Batori of Cantwell and Katelyn Stiles of Juneau were also semifinalists. Arabella, a junior at Cantwell School, turned 17 on Thursday.

Im just excited that it happened on my birthday and I was able to be a part of that. And now Ill always remember it, she said.

The rover is seeking signs of past microbial life and will document the planets climate and geology. The rover is also collecting samples that will be returned to Earth.

Kylers mother, Samantha Frazier, said the family heard about the contest through a Facebook group for their small Interior Alaska community.

Kyler said, I really like space, and Mars is probably my favorite planet and I like robots so I thought, space robot why dont I try to name it?

This Thursday, Feb. 18, 2021 photo provided by NASA shows the Perseverance rover lowered towards the surface of Mars during its powered descent. (NASA via AP)

Kyler, who was a third grader at Tri-Valley School when he submitted his essay, chose the name Wonderment.

The word wonderment means respected and admired and wondering means when you want to know something, Kyler wrote in his essay. I chose this name because the Rover should be both respected and admired. The Rover will be trying to discover something that it doesnt already know. Not everyone or anything can go to space so thats a pretty good goal and something to look up to.

Frazier said her son has always been fascinated by space.

When he found out Pluto isnt a planet anymore, I think he cried for a solid hour. He must have been in preschool, she said. But he just always loved it. Hes had a passion that hes taught me to love.

Arabella said that she suggested the name CMAR, which stands for Cantwell Mars Alaska Rover a creative acronym to honor her beloved community.

I wanted to maybe promote Cantwell a little bit because even though were really small, were a really wonderful place, she said. There are only about 10 students in her school, she said.

Arabella said she was encouraged to submit an essay by teacher Marie Gore, who she said likes to get the students to try to recognize that they have just as much of a chance of winning as a student from a bigger school.

At first, Arabella couldnt think of any names for the rover, she said. But then she thought about how much she loves her hometown.

We are super, super small, she said. Still, with that comes a great sense of community, she said.

So I like that I have a lot of family here. And I like that we have such beautiful lands where we can go hiking and fishing and hunting, she said.

Arabella also watched the landing, which was broadcast live, on her phone with her fellow students cheering during class Thursday.

I could hear people in the next classroom, the elementary, they were all excited because they were watching it live too, she said.

In Juneau, Katelyn, 14, said that she learned about the contest as an assignment in a middle school computer class and suggested the name Perception.

I was also super competitive, so I just kind of put it there. I didnt think it would actually get anywhere, though, she said.

Katelyn thought Perception would be an apt name because it describes the rovers mission and follows the theme of previous rovers, which have been named Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity and Curiosity.

Now a freshman at Thunder Mountain High School, Katelyn was surprised to learn during an interview with the Daily News that her essay had made it all the way to Mars.

It feels weird, she said of the idea that her written words are now on Mars. She said she was worried that there was a mistake in her essay. (There is not.)

Even the aliens will facepalm, she said.

Still, I have bragging rights now, she said.

Kyler Frazier celebrates the Mars rover's landing Thursday. (Photo by Samantha Frazier)

Perseverances mission is part of NASAs Moon to Mars program, which aims to pave the way for human exploration of the red planet and the moon.

Kyler said he hopes to someday explore Mars himself as an astronaut and perhaps find that the stencil of his essay still remains.

Lori Glaze, director of NASAs Planetary Science Division, said that the lines of text on the silicon chip are smaller than one-thousandth the width of a human hair, according to the Fairbanks Daily News Miner.

I hope to go there and see it one day, but I probably need a magnifying glass, Kyler said.

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3 Alaska students' essays have landed on Mars, carried by NASA's Perseverance rover - Anchorage Daily News

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) The world got its first close-up look at a Mars landing on Friday, as NASA released a stunning picture of its newest rover being lowered onto the dusty red surface.

The photo was released less than 24 hours after the Perseverance rover successfully touched down near an ancient river delta, where it will search for signs of ancient life and set aside the most promising rock samples for return to Earth in a decade.

NASA equipped the spacecraft with a record 25 cameras and two microphones, many of which were turned on during Thursdays descent.

The rover is shown in extraordinary detail just 6 1/2 feet (2 meters) off the ground, being lowered by cables attached to an overhead sky crane, the red dust kicked up by rocket engines. NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, promises more photos in the next few days and possibly also an audio recording of the descent.

This is something that weve never seen before, flight system engineer Aaron Stehura noted at a news conference. It was stunning, and the team was awestruck. Theres just a feeling of victory that we were able to capture these and share it with the world.

Chief engineer Adam Steltzner called the picture iconic, putting it right up there with photos of Apollo 11s Buzz Aldrin on the moon, Saturn as seen by Voyager 1, and the Hubble Space Telescopes pillars of creation shot.

A number of thumbnail images have been beamed down so far, too many to count, said Pauline Hwang, strategic mission manager for surface operations. The team went wild at seeing these first pictures, she said.

The picture is so clear and detailed that deputy project scientist Katie Stack Morgan at first thought she was looking at a photo from an animation. Then I did a double take and said: `Thats the actual rover!

The vehicle is healthy, according to officials, after landing on a flat, safe surface in Jezero Crater with just 1 degree of tilt and relatively small rocks nearby. For now, the systems still are being checked. It will be at least a week before the rover starts driving.

The river delta awash 3 billion to 4 billion years ago is just over 1 mile (2 kilometers) away. Scientists consider it the most likely place to find rocks with evidence of past microscopic life.

Another photo of Perseverances front right wheel, near rocks full of holes, already has scientists salivating. Theyre eager to learn whether these rocks are volcanic or sedimentary.

Its the ninth time that NASA has successfully landed on Mars __ and the fifth rover.

As it did with 2012s Curiosity rover still roaming 2,300 miles (3,750 kilometers) away NASAs Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter photographed Perseverance descending beneath its massive parachute. In each case, the spacecraft and chute resembled specks.

Curiositys cameras caught a stop-motion movie of the last two minutes its descent, but the images were small and fuzzy. NASA loaded up the heftier Perseverance and its descent stage with more and better cameras, and made sure they were turned on for the entire seven-minute plunge through the Martian atmosphere.

China will attempt to land its own much smaller rover in late spring. Its been orbiting Mars for 1 1/2 weeks. The United Arab Emirates also put a spacecraft into Martian orbit last week.

___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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Mars landing team 'awestruck' by photo of descending rover - The Associated Press

Perseverance is not just another Rover Mission. Perseverance is the most advanced, most expensive and most sophisticated mobile laboratory sent to Mars. The results of the experiments on Perseverance will likely define the next couple of decades of Mars exploration it will determine the course of search for life and a future manned mission to Mars.

We have come a very long way in understanding Mars from the time of the first generation missions in the 1960s. The Viking missions in the mid-seventies carried out the first chemical analysis of Martian soil, as well as four biology experiments to detect biological activity. The experiments did not yield any conclusive evidence of life.

In the early 1980s, scientists hypothesised, based on mineralogic composition and rock texture, that certain meteorites might have a source region in Mars, in contrast to the asteroid belt. In 1984, a study showed that the isotopic composition of rare gases (Xenon, Krypton, Neon and Argon) matched the isotopic ratios of the Martian atmosphere measured by the Viking spacecraft. This discovery provided a way for geochemists to study Martian samples and provided a huge boost to our understanding of the geochemical evolution of Mars.

Mars was considered to be a dry planet in the 20th century. This changed in 2001, when the Gamma Ray Spectrometer on board the Mars Odyssey spacecraft detected a fascinating hydrogen signature that seemed to indicate the presence of water ice. But there was ambiguity this was because hydrogen can be part of many other compounds as well, including organic compounds.

To test for the presence of water, NASA sent a spacecraft to land near the Martian South Pole in 2007. The spacecraft studied the soil around the lander with its robotic arm and was able to establish, without any ambiguity, the presence of water on Mars for the first time.

The Curiosity rover carries an instrument called SAM (or Sample Analysis at Mars), which contains a suite of spectrometers with the goal of detecting organic compounds on Mars. SAM has a mass spectrometer that can measure not just the elements, but the isotopes as well. This instrument has made the fascinating discovery of large chain organic compounds on Mars. It is not known how these organics form on Mars: the process would likely be inanimate, but there is a fascinating possibility that such complex molecules were formed by processes associated with life.

Mars Insight is creating history right now, by monitoring seismic activity and heat flow on Mars this will help understand the composition of the Martian interior.

Dr Amitabha Ghosh is a NASA Planetary Scientist based in Washington DC. He has worked for multiple NASA Mars Missions starting with the Mars Pathfinder Mission in 1997. He served as Chair of the Science Operations Working Group for the Mars Exploration Rover Mission, and was tasked with leading tactical Rover Operations on Mars for more than 10 years. He helped analyse the first rock on Mars, which incidentally happened to be the first rock analysed from another planet.

Why is Mars so interesting to scientists? And to the explorer-adventurer in all of us? There are two primary reasons.

First, Mars is a planet where life may have evolved in the past. Life evolved on Earth 3.8 billion years ago. Conditions on early Mars roughly around 4 billion years ago were very similar to that of Earth. It had a thick atmosphere, which enabled the stability of water on the surface of Mars. If indeed conditions on Mars were similar to those on Earth, there is a real possibility that microscopic life evolved on Mars.

Second, Mars is the only planet that humans can visit or inhabit in the long term. Venus and Mercury have extreme temperatures the average temperature is greater than 400 degree C, or hotter than a cooking oven. All planets in the outer solar system starting with Jupiter are made of gas not silicates or rocks and are very cold. Mars is comparatively hospitable in terms of temperature, with an approximate range between 20 degrees C at the Equator to minus 125 degrees C at the poles.

Perseverance addresses both the critical themes around Mars the search for life, and a human mission to that planet.

Sample Return Mission: Is there life on Mars?

Perseverance is the first step in a multi-step project to bring samples back from Mars. The study of the returned rock samples in sophisticated laboratories all over the world will hopefully provide a decisive answer on whether life existed on Mars in the past.

Here are the steps in the Sample Return:

As the first step, Perseverance will collect rock and soil samples in 43 cigar-sized tubes. The samples will be collected, the canisters will be sealed, and left on the ground.

The second step is for a Mars Fetch Rover (provided by the European Space Agency) to land, drive, and collect all samples from the different locations, and return to the lander.

The Fetch Rover will then transfer the canisters to the Ascent Vehicle. The Mars Ascent Vehicle will meet with an Orbiter after which the Orbiter will carry the samples back to Earth.

This long-term project is called MSR or Mars Sample Return. MSR will revolutionise our understanding of the evolutionary history of Mars. If MSR is successfully executed, we will have a reasonable answer of whether there was microscopic life on Mars.

But MSR does have its risks. If one of the components fails, like the Fetch Rover or the Mars Ascent Vehicle, MSR is doomed. A hidden risk is strategic. At the cost of MSR, there could be 5-10 spacecraft missions to different parts of the solar system: so hence, by choosing MSR, NASA forecloses the option to undertake those other missions.

Producing oxygen on Mars: A critical requirement

For a human mission to Mars to materialise, the cost needs to be reasonable. For costs to be reasonable, there needs to be a technology and infrastructure in place to manufacture oxygen on Mars using raw materials available on Mars.

Without a robust way to manufacture oxygen on Mars, human missions to Mars will be very expensive, and unrealistic. Without a reliable oxygen production plan on Mars, Elon Musks plan to provide commercial transportation to Mars will be at risk of failure.

Perseverance will have an instrument MOXIE, or Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilisation Experiment that will use 300 watts of power to produce about 10 grams of oxygen using atmospheric carbon dioxide.

Should this experiment be successful, MOXIE can be scaled up by a factor of 100 to provide the two very critical needs of humans: oxygen for breathing, and rocket fuel for the trip back to Earth.

Looking for underground water on Mars

Perseverance will carry the Radar Imager for Mars Subsurface Experiment (RIMFAX). RIMFAX will provide high resolution mapping of the subsurface structure at the landing site. The instrument will also look for subsurface water on Mars which, if found, will greatly help the case for a human mission or the cause of a human settlement on Mars.

Testing a helicopter to fly on Mars

The Mars Helicopter is really a small drone. It is a technology demonstration experiment: to test whether the helicopter can fly in the sparse atmosphere on Mars.

The low density of the Martian atmosphere makes the odds of actually flying a helicopter or an aircraft on Mars very low. Long-distance transportation on Mars has to rely on vehicles that rely on rocket engines for powered ascent and powered descent.

We are perhaps a decade from two milestones in the exploration of Mars: a human mission to Mars, and a decisive answer to the question of whether Mars harboured or still harbours microscopic life. Perseverance is expected to provide significant insight on both questions.

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Explained: Why is Mars so interesting to scientists and to the adventurer that lives in us all? - The Indian Express

It has barely gotten to know its new home on the Martian surface. Yet, Perseverance is sending missives home already.

Some of the first information relayed from NASA's new rover through spacecraft orbiting Mars and back to Earth was data that indicated the rover was healthy after its "seven minutes of terror" from the top of the planet's atmosphere to the surface. It has also sent back a couple of images. Friday night, NASA shared one that shows the rover landing. The image is from a video of the landing thathas not yet been shared with the world.

The snapshot was taken from the descent stage of the spacecraft, which was part of the rover's final landing maneuvers. It lowered Perseverance to the Martian surface on tethers. Curiosity, the last rover to land on Mars, sent back a stop motion movie of its descent. Perseverance, on the other hand, has cameras that were intended to capture video of the touchdown. We'll get a peek at that soon.

In the weeks and months (and years!) to come, we'll get more familiar with Perseverance and all it is capable of telling us about Mars. We can, however, get excited about the imaging capabilities right now. "The majority of Perseverance's cameras capture images in color," NASA says. "After landing, two of the Hazard Cameras (Hazcams) captured views from the front and rear of the rover, showing one of its wheels in the Martian dirt." You can see an image from that angle here as well.

Continued here:

NASA Released Stunning Images of the Perseverance Rover Landing on Mars - Thrillist

Milwaukee native shares in success of NASA's Mars rover

Darian Dixon works as a photographer on NASA's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover and credits his time at Riverside High School and UW-Milwaukee for helping him achieve his science goals.

Updated: 9:13 AM CST Feb 22, 2021

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>> ITS BREATHTAKING EVERY DAY. BEN: MORE THAN 130 MILLION MILES AWAY, DARIAN DIXONS PHOTOGRAPHS ARE AMONG THE MOST SPECTACULAR IN THE SOLAR SYSTEM. IS IT FAIR TO SAY THIS IS A DREAM JOB OF YOURS? >> OH, YEAH. ABSOLUTELY. BEN: THE RIVERSIDE HIGH AND U.W. MILWAUKEE GRAD IS PART OF A TEAM THAT OPERATES THE CAMERAS ON NASA PERSEVERANCE ROVER ON MARS. DIXONS CAMERA WORK WILL HELP SCIENTISTS LOOK FOR ANCIENT SIGNS OF LIFE. >> SCIENCE AND SPACE WERE ALWAYS MY THING, SO I WAS ALWAYS VERY INTERESTED IN SCIENCE, ALWAYS VERY INTERESTED IN SPACE FROM AN EARLY AGE. AND I WAS REALLY FORTUNATE TO HAVE JUST A GREAT FAMILY AND A GREAT MOTHER THAT REALLY NURTURED THAT CURIOSITY, AND NURTURED THAT DESIRE TO LEARN. BEN: DIXON IS ALSO PART OF THE CURIOSITY ROVER MISSION, WHICH CAPTURED THESE STUNNING IMAGES OF THE RED PLANET. WHILE HE LIVES HIS DREAM, HE HOPES KIDS, ESPECIALLY PEOPLE OF COLOR, REALIZE REACHING FOR THE STARS COULD, TOO, LAND THEM ON MARS. >> I DO BELONG IN THESE SPACES. I CAN BE HERE. I CAN DO THIS WORK. AND I WOULD ENCOURAGE EVERYONE, NO MATTER WHO THEY ARE, WHATEV THEIR GOALS ARE, TO NEVER, NEVER LOSE SIGHT OF THAT, AND TO NEVER FOR A SECOND THINK THAT, OH, MAYBE BECAUSE OF WHO I AM AND WHERE I COME FROM, THIS ISNT NECESSARILY A PLACE FOR ME. DOT -- DONT EVER BELIE THAT, NOT FOR A SECOND. BEN: DIXON SAYS HE OWES HIS TEACHERS AT RIVERSIDE AND UWM A TON OF CREDIT FOR HELPING HIM PURSUE HIS PAS

Milwaukee native shares in success of NASA's Mars rover

Darian Dixon works as a photographer on NASA's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover and credits his time at Riverside High School and UW-Milwaukee for helping him achieve his science goals.

Updated: 9:13 AM CST Feb 22, 2021

Originally posted here:

Milwaukee native shares in success of NASA's Mars rover - WISN Milwaukee